Lake Forest defense coming up with timely big plays

Scouts one win away from berth in state semifinals

The Scouts proved that over and over Friday night during their back-and-forth Class 6A second-round game with North Suburban crossover rival Lakes.

But never more than when senior lineman Tom Kutschke stripped the ball from Lakes running back Direll Clark, resulting in Trent Williams' fumble recovery at the Lake Forest 35 with 3 minutes, 53 seconds remaining.

The recovery led to Baylor Broughton's game-winning 26-yard field goal with 1:09 remaining and helped propel the Scouts to the quarterfinals with the 23-21 victory.

"Our kids are resilient," Lake Forest coach Chuck Spagnoli said. "We're happy for them. But this didn't happen on accident. They put an awful lot of effort into getting to this point. More than anything else, we tackle well. The tackling was huge.

"Now we just need to keep it going."

The Scouts have one of the best defenses of the remaining 6A schools, surrendering fewer than 13 points per game.

"We're just playing hard every day in practice," said Williams, who also had a blocked punt last week that led to Lake Forest's first touchdown. "It still hasn't really sunk in yet."

Lake Forest has been a sneaky 10th seed, heading into the playoffs with a 6-3 record. One of its losses was a forfeit due to a one-week teacher strike, while the defense kept the Scouts in both of their other losses, which were by a combined nine points.

Now Lake Forest has a chance at school history when it takes on No. 14 seed Notre Dame (7-4). The Scouts last advanced to the state semifinals in 1978.